People of Jewish origin applying for permission to leave Poland for Israel were obliged (in accordance with the Resolution of the State Council of 23 January 1958) to relinquish the Polish citizenship and to return their identity card and passport. Each family was therefore aware that the journey they were about to make was a one-way journey.
Members of the family, friends and even co-workers would come to railway stations to bid goodbye to the March emigrants, aware that they would not be able to see each other for a long time.
This is how Janina Goldhar remembers the farewell at the Dworzec Gdański train station in Warsaw (https://marzec68.sztetl.org.pl/en/slowo/dworzec-gdanski-obecnie-warszawa-gdanska/), from where the March emigrants left for their strange one-way journey:
'Naturally, the Dworzec Gdański station. Oh yes, many friends. Colleagues from work, and besides, we… a close friend of mine, coworker from the same office… Jews as well, they got tickets to the same train by chance, to the same carriage even. Almost the whole plant was also there, at the station, besides them a good many other friends who were preparing for departure, those who had decided not to leave, and Polish friends. There were crowds at the station'.
The March emigrants most often took a train from the Warszawa Gdańska station to Vienna, from where they flew to Israel. The movables they were taking along to the new place were transported by sea (in containers). It means that the resettlers had to wait several weeks until they could collect their possessions.
In the presented statement, Jerzy Goldhar declares that the items provided in resettlement lists constitute his family members’ property. Subsequently, he provides the names of his wife and daughters. At the end of the document, there is an information that another person leaving Poland together with the Goldhars is Janina Goldhar’s mother (Maria Pogonowska, Proner, née Asterblum; 1897-2009) , 'a pensioner running her own hosehold and living separately until Oct. 1967'. | MF
